


Burning Questions

by HematiteBadger



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Episode 110, Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-27
Updated: 2019-03-27
Packaged: 2019-12-25 06:23:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18255551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HematiteBadger/pseuds/HematiteBadger
Summary: The answers about Hamid's heritage raise even more questions. And not the ones he might have expected.





	Burning Questions

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Smithybadger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smithybadger/gifts).



They had  _ all _  slept late. Hamid, nursing a hangover and stumbling to his feet, felt like that was going to be an important thing to remember once all of them were completely awake, once they'd formulated a plan of attack for the day and were all itching to get going. If anyone tried to offer any pointed looks about the drunken reveler taking a few extra hours to recover, he would be justified in ignoring them. They had  _ all _  needed the recovery time, no matter how much external pressure there was on them to act as quickly as possible.

And the rest had certainly done him some good. Even despite the hangover he felt energized, alive. There was a warmth running through him that had nothing to do with the sun beating down on them, a burst of fire that made a brief but thorough circuit through his veins before settling into the pit of his stomach like a banked coal. It felt as if the shimmering heat that still distorted the air over the glass plain was reaching out for him and  _ into _  him, calling to something similar that was already there and nudging at it to wake up. It was a brief sensation, really only lasting long enough for him to wonder at it before it felt like something that was just  _ part _  of him, like there had been a brief internal jostling but now everything was settled. Whether it had all settled in the same configuration it had had previously, he couldn't be certain. Probably just the last of the alcohol shaking out of his system, he thought, and mostly managed to make himself believe it.

That belief was shaken over breakfast, mostly by the way that Sasha was looking at him. She didn't stare, exactly, and it was furtive enough that he might not have noticed right away, but he was getting used to reading her movements by now. She would study the remains of the compound for a long moment, her brow furrowed, and then shoot an equally furrowed glance at him, speculative and... not concerned, exactly. Or just not concerned  _ yet _ . Like she hadn't made up her mind about something yet. She didn't say anything about her thoughts as he sat down next to her, just held out a canteen to him. "You sobered up yet?"

He flinched a little as he accepted the water, dimly aware that she'd been annoyed with his inebriated enthusiasm last night and hoping that he'd been forgiven after a decent night's sleep for both of them. "That was... not my usual form of conflict resolution," he said, just a little sheepishly.

A grunt and a shrug. "Eh, it worked, didn't it?" Sasha said, which felt like forgiveness, but she was still apparently more interested in the distant sight than him. After a few uncomfortable moments in which Hamid debated whether he should ask if something was bothering her, she tilted her chin in the direction of the former compound. "You gonna be able to do that someday, then?" she asked.

That ground Hamid's thoughts to a halt, and if he'd been actively drinking at the moment he might have choked. Well. That would explain the fiery feeling, wouldn't it? The feeling that he had some connection to the heat haze rippling over them, because he had some connection to its source. He coughed, and it had to be his imagination that he tasted smoke in the back of his throat. "I don't know," he finally managed. "I mean, maybe? Probably? I don't... I don't know exactly how all of this works. But if things keep going the way they have been..." He trailed off, drank a little more water before finishing his reply. "Then yes, it's very possible."

"Because you're going to be a dragon."

She said it so flatly that he didn't know what kind of thoughts she might actually have on the subject, which wasn't much of a reassurance to him. He was still processing the idea himself, still not  _ entirely _  sure what he thought about it. Hearing the opinion of a trusted friend might be a great help in forming his own, and in working out how he was going to deal with this new development that wasn't really new at all. "Well, I don't know if it's quite  _ that _  cut and dried," he said. It wasn't as if he'd had much of a chance to ask anyone about the details, or if anyone even  _ had _  the details. Possibly Apophis knew more than he'd said -- the impression Hamid had gotten from their brief conversation on the subject was that he wasn't the first time something like this had happened -- but it had been neither the time nor the place to ask further questions even if Hamid had been composed enough to do so. "But...  _ part _  of a dragon, apparently? That seems to be about the shape of it, yeah." 

Another non-verbal response, and some part of Hamid was bursting to just  _ ask _  her what she thought, if she was silently judging him for his unexpected heritage or wondering what was going to come next or if this knowledge was going to change him, or if she was maybe just thinking to herself that it was a little bit cool. And with all his other concerns, with everything else that was so much more important to be thinking about, he couldn't help hoping that it was that last one. "I'm still getting used to that thought," she finally said.

Well, that wasn't the worst reaction Hamid could have imagined. He managed a faint, nervous laugh. "Me too," he admitted.

"I mean, it's... I can see where maybe we should have seen it coming," Sasha continued, and Hamid could feel her beginning to gain momentum. Starting a conversation with her might be difficult, but once she got going she was more than capable of carrying one entirely on her own. "You know, with the whole thing at the opera house and all. And with the fire thing you've got going on, but that's, like, plenty of people get super into fire magic without being dragon-y, right? So it's not like it was  _ obvious _ , but I guess it makes  _ sense _ , when you think about it. But it's still..." She trailed off, shaking her head. "You don't expect it, do you? A dragon being quite so... I don't know."

"Small?" Hamid offered a bit coldly, if only to stave off  _ her _  saying it. His shoulders tightened instinctively as he braced himself for the insults to come. It was... well,  _ she'd _  never made him feel like he was something lesser because of his size, not even on those occasions when she'd physically picked him up and tried to carry him out of danger, but that didn't mean that it wasn't still an old, old point of contention between himself and the rest of the world.

" _ Squishy _ ," she corrected, and that was almost worse. "Like, if someone tells you that one of your friends is a dragon, you're not immediately gonna guess that it's the one you're always a little worried about in a fight, are you? That's their whole thing, dragons, being the toughest and scariest thing in the room. Even when they're being nice to you and telling you that Wilde said, like, a really  _ surprising _  lot of good things about you and they're going to let you live. Or, you know, live  _ again _ , I guess." She took a moment to resettle herself after that tangent, her face creasing with a complex tangle of emotions that Hamid couldn't unravel, but then she shrugged it off in her usual manner. "Anyway, it's not like I'm not pretty squishy myself," she added, which was enough to mollify Hamid a bit after that initial and almost certainly unintentional slight. "Nothing wrong with being squishy on its own, if you're good at hitting people without them hitting you back. But I'm also not a dragon."

That was a lot to follow. Talking to Sasha sometimes was, as if there was far too much going on in her head at all times and she didn't know how to get it out in the measured way that everyone else did and so she either told you nothing or far too much. But Hamid hadn't missed the part in there where she referred to him as 'one of her friends,' or where she said that she worried about him. He'd thought... well, he'd sort of assumed that was the truth of it, after everything they'd been through. Or maybe just hoped it. It was so hard to tell with her, and it was nice to have her confirm it, even if she took a roundabout and mildly insulting way to get there. "Well, I'm not a dragon, either," he pointed out reasonably. "Not yet, anyway."

Sasha appeared to consider that one for a moment, and then there was another shrugging sound as she tipped her head to suggest that she'd decided this was a fair point. "Still, though," she added.

Hamid, who had no idea what that was supposed to mean, nodded anyway. "I guess so?"

She gave him an emphatic nod in return. "Right. You get it."

The usual morning shouting from Grizzop, ready to decamp far sooner than anyone else and eager to hustle them all along, saved Hamid from having to try to respond to that. But even as they packed up and headed down to investigate the remains of the compound he could feel Sasha's eyes on him again, looking for something from him and apparently not seeing it. This time, he decided that the direct approach really was probably the best one. "Is there something on your mind?" he asked quietly, sidling up to her as discreetly as possible while the others were occupied.

Sasha didn't say anything for a while, just continuing to scan the area for some hint as to what their next move should be. "Always something on my mind, mate," she said, as casual and careless a dismissal as he could imagine her offering, and Hamid sheepishly followed her lead, searching for clues -- or some clue as to what a clue would look like -- in relative silence.

Their paths split for some time, the two of them going off in opposite directions around a slagged warehouse, but the way they came together again on the other side didn’t feel accidental to Hamid, no matter how casually Sasha sidled up to him. "I've only ever seen two dragons in my life," she said thoughtfully. "Or two and a bit, I guess. No offense."

"None taken," Hamid reassured her, too curious about where this comment was going to waste time being bothered by it.

Sasha nodded at him. "'Course, that's probably two and a bit more dragons than most people see in their lives, isn't it, so maybe it's a little weird to say 'only' like that, but it's still, like, if you've only seen two of something, can you really say for sure if it's always like that? Because, you know, both times I've seen one…” She prodded a pile of glass with the toe of her boot, producing a sad, tinkling crunch. "It's been like this. And it's pretty cool, really, and it's a good way to get rid of a problem quickly when it's a problem like a massive factory building dangerous weapons and stealing water from an entire city, but... well, this is also what they did to the middle of Paris, right? And we didn't have a lot of time to think about it back then, we were just trying to get away, but then you see it up close like this..." She fumbled with the collar of her jacket, turning it down against the heat, and Hamid's eye couldn't help being drawn to the burn scars that splashed across her neck. "Like, I'm all about making sure that the people you knock down don't get up again until you're well away, but there's still such a thing as overkill. And I don't... I mean, no offense to your granddad either, because he seemed like he was, you know, actually  _ listening _ , and thinking about the people he was supposed to be looking out for, but I'm starting to wonder just how much listening something that big really knows how to do anymore."

"He did seem to be willing to understand where we were all coming from..." Hamid started. His family had gone through quite a lot in recent weeks, and the need to protect someone who was technically, if unexpectedly, a member of it was almost instinctive.

"Yeah, maybe," Sasha cut him off, doubtful and unimpressed. She took a deep breath as she turned her face back to him again. "I guess, what I'm asking... You're going to big enough and powerful enough to do this. But are you  _ going _  to?"

It was an important question; Hamid could feel that in the intensity with which Sasha was waiting for his response, the depth of the concern she had turned on him. If only he could understand its origins. "I... maybe?" he hazarded. "I mean, if it was necessary..."

"But that's the thing." Sasha sounded firmer now, on more solid ground, like she thought the two of them were reaching some common ground. "Like, how do you  _ tell _ ? When it's not just, you know, trying to survive the next minute or the next day, or taking out someone who's going to take you out in a second if you don't get them first, how do you know the difference between glassing an entire compound because it really is the best option, and doing it because there's nobody big enough to tell you not to?"

The silence that fell after she ran out of words seemed to hiss in the air, the questions floating in the updraft rising from the heated ground around them. Hamid let out a sharp, quiet hiss of breath, and again the air inside his lungs felt even warmer than the air outside. This was too much like the way that the paladins had questioned him back in Cairo, when they'd started to understand a little bit more about his family and his own history. And the way Apophis had questioned  _ them _ , embroiling them in some ethical quandary that seemed so simple yet at the same time so beyond basic mortal comprehension.  _ Yes, all right, I still don't have all the answers to all the moral questions that you're all so sure about, all right? Is that what you want to hear? _  He barely stopped himself from shouting it, holding his tongue and feeling his shoulders tighten again with the strain of keeping it in. It was especially galling to get this kind of reaction from  _ Sasha _ , of all people, who, for all that he cared deeply for her, was hardly one to talk about other people not having their moral compasses entirely calibrated.

But that was the thing, wasn't it? And it was the reason that he kept himself in check now, when he might have gotten just a little more biting or angry with one of the other two if they had put him on the spot like this. Because Sasha... well, she had her own opinions about how these things worked, of course, but she  _ wasn't _  so divinely dead certain as the others as to what the right answer was, and she wasn't waiting for him to figure out what she already knew. She still had a few questions about the entire subject herself. He sighed, letting his shoulders slump. "I don't know," he finally admitted. "Maybe I did once, or at least I thought I did before all of this started and everything turned out to be more complicated than I realized."

A tiny scoff. "Yeah, fair play, that," Sasha said, some of the wariness lifting from her eyes.

That was encouraging enough that Hamid risked a little smile. "But I'm trying to understand," he said. "I'm trying to work out where all the lines are, and how to listen to the people who seem to know how to see them better than I do. And I think that's... well, it's not the  _ only _  thing, I know, but it's important." And it was important that people  _ knew _  he was trying. "And... if you're worried that I'm just going to end up throwing my weight around, then I suppose I have to... well, learn how  _ not _  to do that while there's still less weight to throw."

It took Sasha a moment to parse that metaphor, which Hamid didn't blame her for. It wasn't his best. After a moment of apparent confusion, though, she gave him a nod. "Yeah, all right," she conceded. "I can see where you're doing that. You're listening to  _ them _ , at least." A tilt of her head towards the paladins. "And there's worse places to start, yeah? They seem pretty damn sure of what they're doing."

"They certainly do," Hamid said quietly, grateful for once that Sasha was likely to miss the undertones he couldn't keep out of his voice entirely. Grizzop and Azu were wonderful people, and the best traveling companions and allies he could ask for, and even if he was still a little...  _ stung _  by recent conversations he wasn't going to risk sowing any more discord than they were already weathering. He tried to make his voice kinder, tried to make his  _ thoughts _ kinder. "They have the right of it when it comes to wanting to protect people, at least, even if maybe we don’t always agree on how to do that. And that’s all I want to do, when you get right down to it. To be able to protect the people I care about. My family. My friends." He hesitated, risking a cautious look up at her, suddenly shy. "And you."

She gave him a hard look, or possibly just an intense one, seeming to scrutinize him to figure out just what that was supposed to mean. "Yeah?" she said again, that all-purpose response that she so often defaulted to. "So where do I fit on that scale, then?"

"That might have come out wrong," Hamid said, feeling vaguely embarrassed by this reaction to what had been an attempt at being a little more open about just how greatly he valued her. "I didn't mean to imply that you  _ weren't _  part of any of those other groups." He hesitated before speaking again. Truth be told, on the scale of 'family' to 'friends' he was beginning to think of Sasha as something closer to the former than the latter, which was more than a little strange considering how brief their relationship had been thus far. But even as absurd as it seemed, it was also the most appropriate comparison he could make. She was someone he couldn't imagine having anything in common with on paper, not anyone he would have connected with over shared interests or a compatible worldview or even overlapping social circles, had the unpredictable nature of the world not thrown them together. And yet, despite the two of them sometimes being so dissimilar that he could hardly believe they were even capable of speaking to each other, there was a connection between them that had been forged in the most improbable of circumstances and tempered to a strength greater than almost any other he could ever remember feeling.

It was something he had difficulty putting into words, and even more difficulty putting into words that he didn't think would disconcert Sasha or be far more than she wanted to hear. He didn't know how close  _ she _  thought the two of them were, after all, and he understood just enough about her own family life to know that she might not appreciate the comparison with the same regard that he meant it. But nevertheless, it was a sentiment he felt needed to be expressed in a way that she would understand, to let her know just how much she mattered in his world. "I don't know how to describe where you are in that list," he admitted, which was only partly true but was probably the best way to put it to  _ her. _  "All I mean is that... I would have to have a damned good reason to rain fire and brimstone down on someone, no matter how easy it might be to do it. And I would consider protecting you to be a damned good reason."

There was something still wary and skeptical in her face as she heard that, and she gave him an assessing look. "You're trying to say you'd pull something like this for me?" she asked.

Well, he was committed now, even if the reaction might not end up being what he'd hoped for. "Yes," he said, as firm and calm as he could make himself. "I would absolutely reduce a mysterious manufacturing compound to glass and rubble for you. In a heartbeat."

There was a moment of silence as Sasha sized him up after that comment. "That's maybe the nicest thing anyone's said to me in a while," she finally said, and there was the faintest curl to the corner of her lip that might have been a smile.

Hamid's shoulders sagged in relief. Whatever else was going to go wrong, at least she seemed to understand this part of it. "It's true, though," he assured her.

"Yeah." That all-purpose expression again, but this time there was something soft about it. A 'yeah' that said  _ I know that you care _ , and possibly even  _ I like that you care _ . ""And, like, it’s nice to hear, just on a personal level, but it’s also just good to know in general, isn't it?" she continued, a little absent again, in that way she got when she was half talking to herself. "Could come in handy, if we ever need it. Might be useful, having a friend in a high place." There was a strangely intense pause after that, as if she was waiting for a reaction. Hamid didn't know which one to offer, uncertain whether this might be some new and unexpected form of sarcasm. "You know," Sasha continued, giving him a look that was the visual equivalent of a patient nudge, trying to get him onto the right track. "A high place. Because you'd be flying. Since you'd be a dragon."

There was a very brief moment in which Hamid reconsidered the sincerity of his loyalty to her. There was so much that he liked about her, and then there was her sense of humor. He sighed, and gave her a weak and weary smile. "Of course. That's a good one, Sasha."

His smile turned almost real as she preened, far more proud of herself than she had a right to be, and then she fixed him with a solid but gentle look. "You're all right, Hamid," she said with great sincerity. "You may be a bit of a ponce sometimes, but you're all right."

That was enough to finally turn it into a sincere grin. By this point, with all that he'd come to understand about her, the insult was almost as easy to look past as the terrible jokes. Almost. "So are you."

There was a calm and comfortable little silence that descended between them, and Hamid felt terrible for breaking it but still couldn't help himself. "So... does that answer your question?" he asked. "Does it take care of... whatever worries you might have had about me?"

A dry little snort. "Wouldn't say I was  _ worried _ , mate," she said, in a voice so calm that Hamid couldn't help doubting it, just a little. "More like... wondering, is all. Curious, like. Just... seeing where everything was going to go. Making sure I wasn't going to... you know."

She seemed to say that so often, when there was no way any of the rest of them  _ would _  know. But with the way that she was looking at him, so nervous and searching, and the way she was standing so much closer to him than was her usual preference, gave him some inkling as to what it might be this time.  _ Making sure I wasn't going to lose someone else _ . 

Hamid had met -- and lived with, and been raised by -- plenty of people who weren't comfortable with physical affection, and while it was a feeling he couldn't really understand it was a boundary he was willing to respect. But, gods,  _ so much _  of the time he spent around Sasha involved wanting desperately to hug her. "Yeah," he said, quietly, echoing her own all-purpose response. He hoped that it conveyed as much when he said it as she seemed to think it did when  _ she _  said it. He cleared his throat. "I don't think you have anything to be concerned about. Not as long as I have good people around me who are going to make sure that I at least  _ try _  to do the right thing. And I don't just mean Grizzop and Azu." He raised a hand and brushed it briefly against her arm, a quick and cautious gesture that was meant to be equal parts reassurance and affection. She gave a little twitch, apparently surprised by the contact, but didn't try to shrug it off or move away from it, which Hamid guessed was probably the best reaction he could hope for. "Thank you for looking out for me," he said. "In multiple senses of the word, I suppose."

There was a moment's hesitation before a hand landed on his shoulder in return, offering a surprisingly heavy and clumsy pat that was nevertheless more than welcome. "I've got your back, mate," she promised. "Long as you've got mine."


End file.
